Kyulux announced that it has signed joint-development agreements (JDAs) with both LG Display and Samsung Display. The LGD agreement was signed in January 2018 while the SDC one was recently signed. Both agreements focus on deep blue Hyperfluoresence / TADF emitters.
Kyulux hopes that by collaborating with the two leading OLED producers, it will be able to accelerate its material development - and it aims to have commercial red, green and blue HF/TADF emitters ready by mid 2019.
Universal Display reported its financial results for Q2 2018 - with revenues of $56.1 million and a net profit of $10.8 million (without the impact of UDC's new accounting system, the revenues would have been $73.6 million and the net income $25.1 million).
UDC says that the first quarter was the bottom for material shipments for 2018, in Q2 materials sales improved and the company believes that the second half of 2018 will see more growth as it anticipates new OLED smartphones from leading brands - including Apple, Google, Samsung and more. UDC estimates that for 2019, the install base of OLED capacity by meters will increase by around 50% compared to 2017.
German TADF developer Cynora presented its latest blue TADF material in May 2018 - with a CIEy of 0.14, EQE of 20% and a lifetime of 20 hours LT97 at 700 nits. Cynora expects to have blue material in the mass production by 2020.
Cynora's Chief Marketing Offer, Dr. Andreas Haldi was kind enough to answer a few questions we had regarding TADF emitters, the differences between next-generation emitter technologies, lifetime, color points and more.
Kyulux announced that it has developed a new blue Hyperfluoresence/TADF OLED emitter. Kyulux managed to extend the lifetime of the material and reached 100 hours at LT95 (@ 750 cd/m2) while maintaining a high EQE of 26% - 22% at 1,000 cd/m2. The emission wavelength is 470 nm.
Kyulux says that its blue Hyperfluorescence emitter is the world’s top performing material at the moment. Kyulux now aims to work together with OLED panel makers to improve the systems further by optimizing the device structure and the rest of the OLED stack in pilot production lines.
In February 2018 it was first reported that Samsung Display is developing TV panels based on hybrid quantum-dots and OLED architecture (QD-OLED). Samsung later confirmed it is developing such technology, but with no immediate plans to commercialize it.
ETNews now reports that Samsung is now working to establish a pilot 8-Gen line for QD-OLED production. ETNews says that Samsung is collaborating with both Canon Tokki and Kateeva to develop the production equipment - apparently the OLED layers will be evaporated using Canon's machines while the QD filters will be deposited using ink-jet printing equipment made by Kateeva. Samsung aims to finalize the production line by the second half of 2019.
Thermal activation sensitized fluorescence, or TASF, is a new type of TADF OLED emitter material developed at China's Tsinghua University. During SID Displayweek, Visionox demonstrated the first TASF prototype display.
We do not have a lot of information on this new emitter technology, except what Visionox provided at the conference: a sky-blue color (468 nm, CIE: 0.153, 0.201), a luminous efficiency of 26.6 cd/A and an external quantum efficiency of over 17%. The brightness of this OLED PMOLED display was 800 nits.
Researchers from Taiwan's National Tsing Hua University (NTHU) and lighting expert Prof. George C. Brainard (one of the principle investigators of the SSL program for the International Space Station) have teamed up for a public call for the adoption of healthier lights.
The researchers aim to collaboration to accelerate the development of healthier lights, which are connected to a range of health problems, including breast and prostate cancers. NTHU's blue-light free candle-light OLEDs may prove to be a good solution to night time lighting.
Researchers from Samsung Electronics and the Ewha Womans University in Korea collaborated in a new study of the degradation in blue phosphorescence OLED materials. This study demonstrate the importance of controlling exciton-induced electron transfer, and more importantly provides strategies for the design of longer-lasting blue PHOLED materials.
The researchers say that the study reveals the charge-neutral generation of polaron pairs (radical ion pairs) by electron transfer from the dopant to host excitons. According to the study, device lifetime correlates linearly with the rate constant for the annihilation of the radical ion pair.
Universal Display reported its financial results for Q4 2017. Revenues reached a record $115.9 million, up 55% from $74.6 million in Q4 2016. Revenues from material sales were $59.8 million (up 105% from $29.2 million in Q4 2016). Net income was $57.9 million (up from $23.1 million in Q4 2016).
UDC concluded a very successful 2017. Revenues were $335.6 million (up 68% from $198.9 in 2016) and net income was $103.9 million (up from $48.1 million in 2016). Net income included a onetime charge of $11.5 million from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Net cash generated in 2017 was $133 million.
ETNews posted an interesting article, claiming that Samsung Display is developing a new TV technology that combines OLED emitters with quantum-dot photo-luminescence materials. The basic idea is to use blue OLED emitters and then convert the blue light to white light using quantum-dots combined with color filters (QDCFs) to add red and green colors.
Samsung OLED TVs (2013)
This seems to be a rather complicated design, but it could be much easier to produce compared to a true RGB OLED TV, as there is no need for precise OLED patterning. This is similar to LG's WRGB OLED TVs which use a white OLED source (made from yellow and blue emitters) and color filters on top.
